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Doug Finley did a good job on those attack ads, Doug Finley says - Macleans.ca

Doug Finley did a good job on those attack ads, Doug Finley says

The Globe is ON IT this morning. Two Conservative senators face charges of breaking election laws and the intrepid Jane Taber is there to interview one of them… about what he watches on TV and the nice stained glass windows in his East Block office.

We need to get Taber and Gadhafi in the same desert tent. Moammar, the world will stand for your lies no longer: Those long, lush eyelashes can’t possibly be natural.

A couple weeks back, Taber gave us the mesmerizing scoop on how Gary Lunn is short but doesn’t mind being so on account of HIS TREMENDOUS MOXIE. Then, she obediently transcribed Stephen Harper’s reflections on how Bev Oda is a Hero To Us All.

And now, another puff piece about another prominent Conservative figure – this time Doug Finley, who is allowed ample space to muse on the genius of Conservative attack ads and the party’s brilliant political strategy without anything so impolite as a hard question.

Taber apparently sat down with Finley before the charges became public. When she called him back for comment, he declined to speak with her. Tellingly, she portrays this not as a dodge but as an Old Party Warhorses Do the Darnedest Things! moment.

To recap: a senior Conservative agreed to be interviewed about how terrific he is – but then refused to talk to the reporter again once he became actual news. This did not stop the Globe from running the piece.

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Doug Finley did a good job on those attack ads, Doug Finley says

All sentiment about Finley's illness and barely suppressed admiration for his attack ad prowess (which ads he claims he never looks at)… could only have been written by Taber. Yech! We're supposed to like this guy?
No questions about Cadman, In and Out, etc. of course, that being a 'human interest' story… puke.

Indeed. We need call out these useless hacks for what they are. The Globe's not alone in this regard, but Maclean's has gotten better by leaps and bounds in the last five years. The Globe seems to be sliding the other way, in no small part to the vacuous scribblings of Taber and Blatchford.

It's obvious to me that having a plane fly in, and then return empty, can't be an intentional move. Given the chaos in Lybia this type of foul-up was bound to happen.

This particular outcome is much better than one possible alternate scenario: a bunch of Canadians (and/or others) make it to the airport, only to find that the plane intended to pick them up never left the ground because someone wasn't 100% sure that there would be anyone at the Lybian airport to extract.

Sure foul-ups were guaranteed to happen in Lybia. However, the Harper government has significantly shifted resources and influence away from DFAIT staff. In part, this is about the drastic simplification of foreign policy that Wells has spoken at length about. In part, this is about the centralization of decision making and control of the message. In part, this is about the deep mistrust of the Conservative government towards career civil servants.

So it is even less surprising that it was a Canadian plane that left empty when filling the plane would have required a high degree of coordination between the staff of different ministries.

Furthermore, I had seen a comment by a Conservative partisan somewhere accusing people of being trivial by criticizing a Minister for lying to Parliament or whatever, while the Harper government was busy Getting Our People Out Of Libya. Which in the end they failed to do for most Canadians there.

Holly Stick on February 27, 2011 at 6:39 pm

Basically I was/am trying to get your comments to be more like Stewart_Smith's, and less like that Conservative partisan you're speaking about.

EeeOar on February 27, 2011 at 7:02 pm

I was mainly posting to get in the joke about in and out. You know, don't you, that two Canadian planes left Libya without any passengers and another was in Europe but did not have enough insurance. So I don't know if it was bad luck or incompetence or some of both, but I see no reason to give the toxic Harper government the benefit of the doubt.http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Harper+announces…

Holly Stick on February 28, 2011 at 3:05 am

You see no reason to give Harper the benefit of the doubt on this occasion or on any occasion?

If the latter, then you would seem to be just as partisan as the Conservative partisan you mentioned.

EeeOar on February 28, 2011 at 11:37 am

except, not liking the current government doesn't make you a partisan… if it does, which party would that be?

George on February 28, 2011 at 3:02 pm

Exactly; I don't like the Liberals much, and am not real enthused about the NDP or the Greens. I miss the Rhino Party.

Holly Stick on March 1, 2011 at 12:28 am

I will keep that in mind. :-)

EeeOar on March 1, 2011 at 1:27 am

Canadians will have to read between the lines on issues originating out of the harper con's government. The media undermines our intelligence, refuses to do investigative journalism and serves us gossip instead of critical information. This government has failed us on many fronts, just the malicious manner of debate and behaviour should be enough to turf them out, and the media has been complicit in giving them undeserved legitimacy. But it is thier incompetence that should deternine thier fate and a bit of responsibility on the part of our media would make a difference.

The media is compllicit in keeping these cons alive, by damning with faint praise their malicious behaviour they give them legitimacy. Harper's incompetence is legendaryr, ripe with fodder for the investigative journalist worth his wage.

Some media people do go after Harper sometimes, for example this column by Dan Gardner:

"…Ladies and gentlemen, it's my job to be blunt. So I'll just say it: Stephen Harper is incompetent.

I know that's not his reputation. Lots of people accuse him of being ruthless, or an ideologue, but he's usually credited with being a basically competent manager.

He doesn't deserve that credit. His government is badly run and incoherent. Promising fiscal conservatism, Stephen Harper spent money like crazy, expanded the federal government, cut taxes, and turned a surplus into a structural deficit (yes, it's structural, as even the International Monetary Fund agrees). He has no real plan for getting the budget back into balance…"http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Harper+governin…

It's the long continuing pattern of not telling the truth, with hundreds of examples through the last few years, which the Ottawa media has decided is really clever politics, to be praised not condemned.

"For all those who say that negative ads turn off voters, Mr. Finley responds: “Politics is an adversarial business. Kellogg's doesn't make their money by telling everybody General Foods are a great product.”

Kelloggs doesn't run out of context quotes and invent motive and insinuate nafarious explanations for why General Foods is only in it for themselves either. Finley's rationalizing of his amoral communications strategy is truly pathetic. Yes we know Doug…the libs did first and worst, which is fortunate since it absolves you of all responsibility, doesn't it?
Hopefully we'll be spared a future confessional tell all revealing how…sob…sob…he really really regrets ever having used such tactics. Although he should have little difficulty in persuading Taber to run it up for him.

A unidentified source from General Mills reports that Kellog's Corn Pops will rot your teeth and cut your mouth. "Sure it tastes great, but it's the breakfast food equivalent of crack cocaine. Don't try it even once."

Good point. Private companies generally treat each other with respect. They've tried direct misleading attacks, but they must not have worked, so they stopped. But it works in politics.
Of course if Kelloggs attacked General Mills the way The Cons attack Iggy and Dion, General Mills would fight back hard even viciously to defend their reputation. They wouldn't have the naive notion that people will see through the unfairness of it all.
That seems to be the Liberal's position. They've miscalculated badly.

I don’t hold Macleans in any higher journalistic regard than Feschuk holds the Globe/Taber.

Their opinion piece (unsigned, except for a vague “by the editors”) on usage-based Internet billing, contained questionable logic (possibly under te influence of parent company Rogers) and generated about 700 comments (mostly dissenting and critical).

And the piece seems to have disappeared completely from the opinion section of this website – in fact, it seems to have been buried on the Macleans website so well, you’ll only find it if you Google it.

It doesn’t even appear under ‘most read’ on the sidebar. When was the last time a Macleans piece generated 700 comments? Why is Macleans trying to hide it?

You’d think a Macleans piece that generates 700 comments would be a little easier to find on their website, but no, Macleans has done their best to hide it.

Macleans commenting on journalistic integrity? Isn’t there an adage about glass houses of relevance here?

Of course there is the "We are all base and animalistic and what not, and some of us like to fool ourselves into believing that we are different by looking upward to the stars, so that we don't see the truth." :-(

EeeOar on February 28, 2011 at 11:27 am

I still don't get "it" (may be a culture thing, or may be I do get "it" without knowing I do) but it sounds quite funny.

How is the Globe article much different than the Macleans article from two weeks ago, other than timing?

The Macleans piece also mentioned stained-glass windows, and added other frivolities such as his view of Stephen Harper's office window (creepy…), and his beard (yes, his beard). In fact, the two articles are at times word-for-word.

Unfortunately, such articles as this Feschuk post are much easier to find on the Macleans website than more important pieces such as the controversial and fallacious editorial on usage-based Internet billing.

If Macleans and Scott Feschuk are concerned about journalistic integrity, they need look no further than the magazine's relationship with Rogers when discussing UBB and other tech-related subjects, and not hide their own editorial on UBB (and the 700+ dissenting comments that followed).

What about the softball questions Peter Mansbridge gives PM Stephen Harper? There was so very, very much he could have got into… and instead, Mansbridge prefers to have a friendly living room chat with our PM! Mansbridge never pursues it when the PM dodges anything, never gives any tough questions, never follows up… just gives our lying PM a pass and acts like his fawning admirer. This isn't a political interview; it's friendlier than a Jay Leno interview with a guest!

Journalists should never quote from 'an official spokesperson in the PMO' as they did again this week on In and Out. Protecting the anonymity of sources is important in journalism to protect those who are coming forward with information and who are at risk for divulging it. It is to protect the weak. Protecting the anonymity of official spokespersons in the PMO is cloaking the government from scrutiny, it is participating in government secrecy. Journalists shouldn't do this.

Not at all — it's paramilitary and the result was the same. The government allowed a (para) military organization to have free reign on the streets of Toronto for one weekend last June. It's well documented. You can't make this suff up..

The thugs in the streets of Toronto last summer were not soldiers. They were cops acting under the direction of your police chief, using a "pretend" authority granted to them by Dalton McGuinty. The chief of police has conceeded that he knew he was giving his cops illegal orders, and he still has his job 8 months later.

You don't help to safeguard civil rights by (deliberately?) misrepresenting what happened.

What happened at the G20 was an abomination in a free society. It wasn't just another episode to be spun for partisan bickering.

Um sorry but I believe you're giving Harper a free ride here. He was told in advance that having the G20 in Toronto would be a logistical nighmare. We had cops (the para military) banging innocents over the head, firing rubber biullets at peaceful protesters, ripping off prosthetic limbs from disabled persons, etc. The evidence is clearly documented. The rot starts at the top and descends all the way down. Of course, Steve being who he is, isn't man enough to own up to his responsibilities — he never has and I suspect he never will.

The police violated the human rights of thousands of people, illegally detained close to a thousand, beat people, bullied and assaulted peaceful protestors and bystanders alike. They strip-searched people who were detained illegally (otherwise known as sexual assault) and generally behaved like cowardly barbarians.

The Chief of Police give his officers instructions about their authority which he knew to be in excess of their legal authority because he figured "it would be better" if they had that authority.

The provincial government enacted extraordinary "secret" laws and failed to communicate that decision to the public.

And the federal government choose a location that was "a logistical nightmare."

In the word's of the Ontario ombudsman it was "the most massive compromise of civil liberties in Canadian history."

And who is responsible for that situation, in your view?
Stephen Harper
And why is he responsible, again, in your view?
Because he choose the location.

If you think this situation arose out of a decision about the location then you & I have a different conceptions of cause and effect. Harper's decision on the location may have made the job of the police more difficult. But difficult circumstances don't ever justify the complete trashing of civil liberties which is what occured in Toronto.

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